Whether you are aware of the "big data" buzzword or not, you'll certainly be aware that the amount of data around us is growing, and growing rapidly. And as it continues to grow, compounded by the internet, social media, cloud computing and mobile devices, it poses both a challenge and an opportunity for the public sector – how to manage, analyse and make use of the ever-increasing amount of the data being generated and how to realise the benefits of doing so.

We have worked with the Centre for Economics and Business Research (Cebr) on the first ever comprehensive study into the economic impact of big data on the UK economy, Data Equity: Unlocking the value of big data. The report established that better analysis of the growing amount of information could generate economic benefits equivalent to £111.5m per day by 2017, as well as creating 58,000 jobs.

For the public sector alone, the report forecast that capitalising on the value of big data could mean savings of £2bn by reducing fraud and £4bn through better management over the next five years. A further £6bn could be gained through more effective use of performance data within the healthcare system. Finally, to manage the process of analysing big data, 2,000 new public sector jobs could be created. This is an opportunity that the public sector cannot afford to pass up on.

By learning to better collect, integrate, share and analyse data, the public sector will be able to transform its processes and services. What's more, the opportunity for change isn't in 10, 15 or 20 years' time, but now. The government already holds vast quantities of public data, but too often it sits in silos – unloved and underused.

The public sector must share the data it has, and use solutions such as high-performance analytics to transform it into information that it can use to enhance its services. The retail sector is already taking steps to extract value from the huge volumes of data that it sits on. Every minute of every day, supermarket loyalty card s effortlessly collect, store and analyse customer data, and the intelligence gleaned here is used to inform decisions on everything from promotions to store locations and supply chain management.

The private sector will not miss the opportunity to capitalise on big data, so it's really up to the public sector to decide whether it wants to sit back and watch from afar, or start unlocking real value from its data.